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The Game Future NRL Stadiums part II

SLRBRONCOS

Referee
Messages
22,812
What kind of shithouse stockbroker lives In Brisbane?
Reference to the chairman, he lives in an $18m home in Kangaroo Point. Does his day job quite well. Aside from that the largest full service retail (non sophisticated/ wholesale/ institutional) stockbroking firm in Australia started in and is headquartered in Brisbane. Obviously the big $$$ sit with Sydney and Melbourne however Brisbane has a crack, as does Perth with the speccies.
 

Perth Red

Post Whore
Messages
65,408
PR, there is unlikely to be growth in crowds. Sports crowds were declining across the nation pre-COVID. It is a miracle RL crowds have been able to hold steady. Most population growth in Sydney and Melbourne is via immigration from Asia and Africa and so far these immigrants don't seem to be packing out RL games.

17.5K is perfect. What if crowds don't recover post-COVID and the 15K average crowd become 12K? Much better to keep stadiums small and pack them out. This creates demand, which leads to more profitable stadiums and clubs. The two most profitable (per match) stadiums in Australia are Optus in Perth and Geelong - stadiums where supply is often greater than demand. It is certainly not ANZ or MCG.

And thank god Moore Park will be 42.5K not bigger. 30K would have been better, but 50k+ would be a disaster.

sorry but totally disagree. There’s a big range of factors in growing sports crowds, nrl and it’s clubs at the moment are largely doing nothing to grow crowds. If Storm had moved into a 17k aami they wouldn’t be getting the crowd avg’s they are getting today. That’s money the club would t be earning to reinvest in getting bigger. If anything nrl at the moment is well below would it should and could be as the number one sport in some decent population centres. Get it right and nrl clubs could be huge.
 

Perth Red

Post Whore
Messages
65,408
What people forget is many of Melbourne's AFL teams are closely bunched together. The old home grounds of Collingwood, Carlton, and N.Melbourne are roughly 5 km away from the MCG while Richmonds home base is next to the MCG. That's probably why the AFL adopted a two stadium policy in Melbourne.

Compare that with Penrith to Moore Park, it's an hours drive. Sydney's NRL teams are located far and wide by comparison.

afl clubs draw their fans from right across the cities they are in, they are not restricted by their small suburban names eg carlton has 19k population and the afl club has 70k members! The central stadium policy in a city with decent transport infrastructure means clubs can attract from far and wide unlike Sydney nrl which is still only appealing to the couple of hundred thou in their immediate vicinity. That being said it doesn’t explain why other cities sports crowds are so disparate such as perth afl vs brisbane nrl.
 

parrawentyfan

Juniors
Messages
729
But there is a geography element too. Melbourne's CBD is actually in the centre of the city. Sydney's CBD is squashed into the eastern edge of the city making it not great for a code with its heartland on the opposite side of the city.
 

It's Been Done

Juniors
Messages
614
But there is a geography element too. Melbourne's CBD is actually in the centre of the city. Sydney's CBD is squashed into the eastern edge of the city making it not great for a code with its heartland on the opposite side of the city.

It also helped the VFL/AFL's cause that all clubs (except for Geelong) were located within 15km of the CBD until 1982 and unlike the NSWRL, never expanded into the outer suburbs with the exception of the construction of Waverley Park in Mulgrave to be their HQ which allowed teams to claim the outer suburban fans and largely wiped out the reluctance to travel
 

T-Boon

Coach
Messages
15,146
afl clubs draw their fans from right across the cities they are in, they are not restricted by their small suburban names eg carlton has 19k population and the afl club has 70k members! The central stadium policy in a city with decent transport infrastructure means clubs can attract from far and wide unlike Sydney nrl which is still only appealing to the couple of hundred thou in their immediate vicinity. That being said it doesn’t explain why other cities sports crowds are so disparate such as perth afl vs brisbane nrl.

part of it is they love the sport more than NRL fans love NRL. A lot more. Someone on here called them zealots. But NRL is the odd one out. American football fans are more fanatical than AFL fans, so are Premier League.
 
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Perth Red

Post Whore
Messages
65,408
part of it is they love the sport more than NRL fans love NRL. A lot more. Someone on here called them zealots. But NRL is the odd one out. American football fans are more fanatical than AFL fans, so are Premier League.

there certainly doesnt seem to be the culture of actively supporting your club like other leading sports have. Newcastle people aside, they seem to the exception in Australian rugby league and despite years of sht still turn out in big numbers. With that in mind it means clubs need to work much harder to overcome their fans apathy.
 

Vee

First Grade
Messages
5,072
part of it is they love the sport more than NRL fans love NRL. A lot more. Someone on here called them zealots. But NRL is the odd one out. American football fans are more fanatical than AFL fans, so are Premier League.
I had an Argentina mate come over and went to the G. Bought a ticket, asked where he should sit, was told, "sit anywhere". Couldn't believe rivals could sit next to each other, not what he was used to with Boca juniors v river plate.
 

The Great Dane

First Grade
Messages
7,723
To many people in brisbane the broncos are just a corporate entity fed by unlikeable stockbrokers and controlled by a ghastly media empire.

Brisbane 2 will become extremely popular. The Dolphins are already pretty rich so they can take the broncos on well.
Dolphins are the perfect club to take on the Broncos. I hope the Broncos keep struggling and the Titans keep improving.
Giving the Dolphins an NRL license would be a massive mistake.

In the battle for hearts and minds they'd lose at least for the short to mid term, and the NRL doesn't have the time to wait long term.
 
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3,224
Giving the Dolphins an NRL license would be a massive mistake.

In the battle for hearts and minds they'd lose at least for the short to mid term, and the NRL doesn't have the time to wait long term.
well we don't know that for certain

the Titans were a pretty handy outfit from day one , competitive because they recruited well. No reason the Brisbane Dolphins couldn't do the same.

Munster should be their marquee signing for 2023 & the Franchise built around him
 
Messages
11,594
TBF their first season drew +21k and that was WITH the first stages of the SL protests.

The potential was DEFINITELY there, they just picked the worst possible moment to join.


Exactly. Proves there was an appetite in Brisbane to support a club other than the Broncos
 

The Great Dane

First Grade
Messages
7,723
well we don't know that for certain
Considering the histories of other sports clubs whom in the past have attempted to do what the Dolphins are trying to do, yes we do have a very strong idea that that is true, because those other clubs all failed.
the Titans were a pretty handy outfit from day one , competitive because they recruited well. No reason the Brisbane Dolphins couldn't do the same.

Munster should be their marquee signing for 2023 & the Franchise built around him
If we are banking on on-field success to make the club a success then we shouldn't even bother.

On-field success is fleeting, it's how your club survives when times are tough that really matters.
 
Messages
3,224
Considering the histories of other sports clubs whom in the past have attempted to do what the Dolphins are trying to do, yes we do have a very strong idea that that is true, because those other clubs all failed.

If we are banking on on-field success to make the club a success then we shouldn't even bother.

On-field success is fleeting, it's how your club survives when times are tough that really matters.
you've already been told they're a wealthy club at BRL/QRL level with their own leagues club , why wouldn't they survive in tough times ?
rendering your 2nd point .... pointless
 

The Great Dane

First Grade
Messages
7,723
you've already been told they're a wealthy club at BRL/QRL level with their own leagues club , why wouldn't they survive in tough times ?
rendering your 2nd point .... pointless
I never suggested they wouldn't survive financially, I said they'd lose the battle for hearts and minds...

The NRL doesn't need another failing football business with no fans that is perpetually propped up by rich owners and NRL grants.

What it needs is a behemoth of a club, with a large fan base (big enough to rival the Broncos), that can survive off it's football operations alone.

Unless they make major changes to their brand and target audience, the Dolphins simply aren't capable of that, and they'd end up being a mix between Brisbane's version or Manly and/or Easts, and we don't need that when there is the potential to build something much bigger.
as long as they're not called Redcliffe , they might be the best option backed by $$ & a licensed facility.

the Brisbane Dolphins
I like it
The Dolphins brand is the problem!

Change their geographic representation all you like, people will still see them for what they would be; the Dolphins in drag and 'Brisbane' in name only.

If there was a league above the NRL and one of the other Sydney clubs was moving into it, but changed their name to (e.g.) the Sydney Eels, would you follow them?
Of course you wouldn't, no self respecting Panthers fan would ever be caught dead in an Eels jersey no matter whether they claimed to be from Parra, Sydney, or the bloody moon. So why are you expecting any different reaction from footy fans in Brisbane?

Now history shows that if they (the Dolphins or our hypothetical Eels) created a neutral brand, one that the vast majority of what should be their target audience hasn't grown up hating for generations, then we've got something with potential. But the Dolphins aren't doing that, so that alone should rule them out for the license.
 

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